Patrick and all,
Skip to is a hack use of good internal linking structure. If you see sites
that have good internal linking structures, you will see sites that do not
need to and never use the words "skip to" anywhere on them. Also, skip to
is useless for large numbers of users rather well targeted internal linking
achieves a much better user interface. I've oft heard it said that use of
skip to as a hack often messes up tab index and has to be specially handled
by the author in order to make it come out right.
If I have lynx set up to have links and formfields numbered, every link is
easily accessible by typing its number and pressing enter. Skip to is
useless to lynx. Skip to begs the question over all because it sets asside
good page structure.
Johnnie Apple Seed
----- Original Message -----
From: "Patrick H. Lauke" <redux@splintered.co.uk>
To: <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>
Sent: Monday, February 14, 2005 9:52 AM
Subject: Re: Copywriting for Screenreaders (was Alt text for URL's)
david poehlman wrote:
> I disagree. What we need is a guide to optimal use and configurability
> for
> all by all. Skip to is ahack and can be miss construed badly and is
> often
> badly implemented and miss understood and is also being used as a
> marketing
> trick... The most usefull thing that can be done in this regard is to put
> in well defined internal links.
david, sorry, but i am having a hard time understanding what you're
actually getting to. "skip to" are internal links, are they not? what is
the alternative? how can you define what is content and what is
navigation? sure, you could take a hardline approach and say that
everything in the BODY is content, and that any navigation should reside
in the HEAD as LINK elements, but that's...unrealistic at this stage.
what are you proposing as a means to allow users to jump over the main
navigation and straight to the content (or, vice versa, skip over the
content and straight to the site navigation)? there are no agreed,
standard mechanisms for this...or am i missing something?
--
Patrick H. Lauke
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